What is wrong with this picture?

[Mulan]

Actually, the women would quickly feel overwhelmed and intimidated in high school co-ed MA training just like they did in our high school co-ed gym class basketball games!

Anybody would feel overwhelmed and intimidated if the teachers were chauvanist pigs, and the special treatment they gave the guys made them cocky and confrontational. Trust me, I've been in NYC public school co-ed gyms. The teachers are sexist as hell, and so are the guys, as you so adequately prove. I would love to bore you with psychological research about self-fulfilling prophecies and how women score drastically different on math, spatial, physical, verbal and other skills based on how much practice they've had, the sex of the experimentor, there being males in the room, and the wording of the instructions, but this is a martial arts board...

You really should take a MA class and then you'll find out real fast that this Akiddo type garbage never works in a real comfrontation.

Really? I seem to remember a famous kickboxing champion saying that Aikido is great for self-defense. I think I trust his word over yours. Leverage, positioning, etc... does work! It's basic physics and there's nothing fancy about it. Whether or not it's taught properly and whether or not it has a fast learning curve is a whole other matter.

FYI, firepower and brute force rule in the street (always have and always will) and the guys just happen to have more of it than the women and they improve on it even faster. Many women don't even know how to make a proper fist when they join a karate school so they're starting out behind the curve from day one.

You really need to work on your reading comprehension skills. Did I ever deny the importance of force or even brute strength? I did say that there are techniques that defeat force and brute strength, but that's besides the point. The idea of the above post was that there is a point where force and strength pleateu, and training it further would only handicap you because it would take away from training in other aspects of your fighting skill. I don't care if you're a world-champion bodybuilder, if you don't know how to fight, you're screwed. Women can and do learn to hit "hard enough." Whether or not they know how to make a proper fist the first day of Karate class is irrelevant. That's what they're there to learn.

I'm pretty sure that, in the military, the women train hand-to-hand with the guys. These days women are on the supply lines so they'd need the same type of training as the guys.

I don't have the statistics on that and obviously neither do you. From what I understand, the military has a lot of specialized positions, and the majority of your training is geared towards things related to your position. Since women aren't allowed in the infantry and aren't expected to engage in ground fighting, I would imagine their combat training is a lot less intensive than the men's. And even if I'm wrong about that, it would still not answer the question of how they train. That is, whether they train in ways designed for their body type (maximize strengths, minimize weaknesses, train techniques that defeat size and strength). I know a guy who's in the Finnish military, where they do allow women into combat. He has trained alongside women and says he did not notice any difference in either hand-to-hand or weapon skills.

Over the years I've nailed enough pretty damnerd good women tennis players right in the boobs with a tennis ball to know that even a trained women has slower hands then the average guy! Also, the women in my Kempo school didn't only have slow hands, they also had zero weight behind their punches.

Of course everybody knows that men never get hit in tennis... Look, I do not care if the women in your sexist New Jersey tennis school suck. Missing a ball in tennis proves nothing about hand speed, nor do tennis skills correlate to martial skills. If the women in your Kempo school had slow hands or didn't have weight behind their hits, it is because they need to train harder and learn the principles of generating force behind their punches. But for all I know, nobody ever bothered explaining this to them. Course you know what they say... if a girl doesn't hit hard enough, it's cause she's a girl; if a guy doesn't hit hard enough, it's cause he should train more.

[shuyun]

my two bits

there's kinda too much to reply too so i'd better wing this first part first and take it from there.

one i agree that with a things being equal (including sanity) the stronger fighter wins (thats regardless of gender). in the norm guys are more muscular. but many things are not normal. so with Xena vs. peewee herman I'd vote for Xena.

regarding chi kung and spear bending and all, it just takes too much time to set up the "invulnerability" and too much focus to make it practical (i'm not saying its a hoax).

if one were ever so rude to prick a guy's ass with a pin while spear bending, or tickle his ear with a feather, or say "i dated your sister last night", i don't think that the results would be pretty.

sure some guys break bricks and even cinder blocks (maybe not that poor guy mentioned in the thread) but again set up time is too much to be practical. break a loose raging bull's skull in one blow while it's charging you then i'd be impressed with your breaking skills. that's pressure to make your technique work when there's no time to setup.

i don't doubt that the weaker can beat the stronger but its harder to do so. to place your trust in that statistic would be suicide and you might just end up being a statistic.

the reason why it's so easy to pick on the big guys is that we assume that the smaller ones use their brains and the big guy's don't. but imagine a 200+ lb karateka who is knowledgeable of takedowns throws and grapples (will disengage when forced to) and decides to use a cinder block breaking technique against your skull (temple) your sternum (right over the heart). Chi kung cannot strengthen raw bone. bone itself is a mineral it is subject to the laws of stress and material stength. and a smaller body has smaller bone mass.

while chi kung masters can pull san fransisco trams using their genitalia (ripleys believe it or not) those same masters will not stand in the way of a rushing 4x4 truck.

tai chi and chi kung (qi gong --- whatever) can "increase" the body's stability and strength by maximizing the archetectural possibilities in the body. the right stance and proper body mechanics can tap a few more kilograms of strength by unifying other muscles into the motion that most MA practicioners are not aware of. (e.g. "using the earth" as your accelerant in a push hands technique). but the stronger person can still do the technique more powerfully (with the same amunt of training of course). and of course the stacking over the dan tienthing makes you a whole ot more stable. i can push hands some one 2.5 times my mass. but i'm not gonna tell him how i do it or else he'll figure out a way to stop me.

of course if a someone does this you can do this ..... its paper, stones and scissors as another respondent put it. as esoteric as the arts have become good science is helpful in measuring our acheivements as well as our limits.

"energy cannot be created or destroyed." no my dear our energy is not infinite that is why people get hungry, get tired or die. we cannot produce limitless force and our upper limit is based ultimately on or mass because force = mass/acceleration. you may be able to punch a big guy harder because of your acceleration but it would be a scary day when the big guy can also acelerate as fast as you can (and it happens).

penultimately, muscle mass does not slow us down. runners are faster when they have more developed muscles,so do swimmers. but yes there is diminishing returns in weight training. the strength muscle:mass ratio is less in big guys but ratio aside the total strength is still more.

lastly i do not underestimate women fighters. my girlfriend packs a nasty right hook (my doing i trained her) she gave me a black eye once. but i will not left hook her back because i know i can break her skull. heck my parries can already hurt her. given the same mass she may injure me harder but her 90lb frame just won't generate that much force even with chikung (though vital point strikes are another story i teach her that to).

go women martial artists go mulan.

[Mulan]

regarding chi kung and spear bending and all, it just takes too much time to set up the "invulnerability" and too much focus to make it practical (i'm not saying its a hoax).

From what I understand, Chi Kung (and basically all internal arts) are a lifetime process, so I can only assume you get better and it gets easier to focus over the years of training. It's rare, but apparently there are people out there, historically and presently, that were/are able to use it in combat if they keep a Zen empty-mind mindset. That is, trained to have no emotion and therefore no distractions in combat.

i don't doubt that the weaker can beat the stronger but its harder to do so. to place your trust in that statistic would be suicide and you might just end up being a statistic.

I just got done watching the first UFC, and boy that gave me a laugh. For all the talk about it on these forums, the muscular, heavy, big guys dropped like flies and the finals were quite litterally between the two scrawniest guys in the competition (Royce Gracie and... that-other-guy). I ask again... what is wrong with this picture? Another neato thing I learned, jiu jitsu has no weight categories in their competitions. In fact, to quote the announcer, "weight really doesn't matter" (in jiu jitsu). I guess that's why BJJ co-ed women and men.

Also, Royce Gracie is frikkin hot! But moving on...

penultimately, muscle mass does not slow us down. runners are faster when they have more developed muscles,so do swimmers. but yes there is diminishing returns in weight training. the strength muscle:mass ratio is less in big guys but ratio aside the total strength is still more.

I see muscle mass and toning as different. That is, muscle mass can slow you down, but toning can speed you up. The muscle that runners and swimmers have are developped through running and swimming, yes? That is, the muscles that naturally develop are those that they need to run/swim more efficiently. But I also see swimming/running speed as different from movement speed. Running speed, for example, has a lot to do with leg-length rather than how fast they move. That is, if a person with long legs moves those legs just as fast as a person with short legs, the person with long lengs will win... but the movement speed of the legs was the same. But there's ways to train speed.

lastly i do not underestimate women fighters. my girlfriend packs a nasty right hook (my doing i trained her) she gave me a black eye once. but i will not left hook her back because i know i can break her skull. heck my parries can already hurt her. given the same mass she may injure me harder but her 90lb frame just won't generate that much force even with chikung (though vital point strikes are another story i teach her that to).

Glad you don't underestimate us, and thank you for your post! Sounds like your girlfriend needs some conditioning training if your parries hurt her. That and... 90lbs?! Give the poor girl a sammich! Girls can hit "f*cking hard," but that's probably not their strongest martial asset, yes? Jiu Jitsu seems to be pretty weight-neutral, mebbe you can stack that onto the general force/pressure-point/etc training, ne? I'm sure you know better than I do, tho.

go women martial artists go mulan.

Thank you! All things being equal, the stronger fighter will win. But, as you said, things are rarely normal or "equal." You have to be an insane genious to actually master every form of martial art, so I would assume that 99.9% of fighters have a limited set of moves in their arsenal. Each move has advantages and disadvantages, and those advantages and disadvantages are blind to gender (if a given woman happens to be physically stronger than a given man, then gosh darnit that's her advantage... and vice versa). If a given woman knows a set of techniques that defeat the attacks of a given man, and uses those techniques and tactics competently, then she shall win... and vice versa. That's all it really comes down to, imo.

[shuyun]

From what I understand, Chi Kung (and basically all internal arts) are a lifetime process, so I can only assume you get better and it gets easier to focus over the years of training. It's rare, but apparently there are people out there, historically and presently, that were/are able to use it in combat if they keep a Zen empty-mind mindset. That is, trained to have no emotion and therefore no distractions in combat.

the years of practice is what makes it impractical. i'm not for mc dojos or get quick rich schemes but many guys need quick results in their training. You train so you won't be bullied in the hood and you can do that only after years of practice?! that makes people deperate.

I just got done watching the first UFC, and boy that gave me a laugh. For all the talk about it on these forums, the muscular, heavy, big guys dropped like flies and the finals were quite litterally between the two scrawniest guys in the competition (Royce Gracie and... that-other-guy). I ask again... what is wrong with this picture? Another neato thing I learned, jiu jitsu has no weight categories in their competitions. In fact, to quote the announcer, "weight really doesn't matter" (in jiu jitsu). I guess that's why BJJ co-ed women and men.

no dear weight does matter. again in judo (product of jujutsu historically just less atemi but with choles and locks and armbars too) touraments the contestants are classified according to weight. they all know the techniques and so weight makes them unequal. royce won back then because BBJ was a novelty back then. he also started this bad trend that you need to be a grappler to win the UFC thing. but he lost to sakuraba in pride because the guy knew his tricks. and yes i do know the difference between building an toning and you still get muscle mass in toning. they're just smaller looking muscles but heck they're dense.see Gary Daniels 5th dan karateka. he's big and trim toned and built and he's fast. Mark dacascos too. its the falbby guys that are slow. Segal to name one. and by muscle mass i don't mean the muscle bound type (which according to weiht trainers is actually a sort of myth).

what's your prefered martial art by the way?

[Mulan]

what's your prefered martial art by the way?

My focus is on Tai Chi Chuan and Chi Kung. I do plan to branch out into some other types of Kung Fu (Shaolin, Wing Chun) or Jiu Jitsu/Ju Jutsu, but I want to get a good grip on Tai Chi Chuan first. I'm not really learning it for self-defense, mind you. More for the energy work, the history/culture, the artform, the mind-body link, the spiritual aspects, etc... the self-defense I see as more of a by-product of all that that comes after many years of dedicated training and meditation. It is my philosophy that when training in internal martial arts, you will get the best results if you focus on the mental/energy work and not have winning in the external fashion be at the forefront of your mind, because that skews your priorities. Martial Arts to me is not something that you learn for a year to kick the local bully's ass, but a long-term commitment, the benefits of which find their way into each and every aspect of your life.

Mmmm I know weight matters, but I guess in Jiu Jitsu it just matters a lot less. And even tho there's weight classes in Judo, there apparently aren't in BJJ - at least according to the announcer.

[mrniceguy148]

.
Of course everybody knows that men never get hit in tennis... Look, I do not care if the women in your sexist New Jersey tennis school suck. Missing a ball in tennis proves nothing about hand speed, nor do tennis skills correlate to martial skills. If the women in your Kempo school had slow hands or didn't have weight behind their hits, it is because they need to train harder and learn the principles of generating force behind their punches. But for all I know, nobody ever bothered explaining this to them. Course you know what they say... if a girl doesn't hit hard enough, it's cause she's a girl; if a guy doesn't hit hard enough, it's cause he should train more.

I've been hit plenty of times playing tennis (doubles) but in the back, not in the chest or the groin. That's because I know how to dodge a tennis ball, and it's something many women have trouble learning. Missing a tennis ball has everything to do with hand speed because if a skilled women still has trouble reacting to a tennis ball coming at her from thirty feet away then how well do you think she'll react to a hailstorm of punches coming at her from point blank range?

The fact of the matter is that tennis is very much like the striking arts in that with both you have to use your legs and coordinate body torque in order to generate power.

I can't say what happened with the women in my karate school. All that I can say was in the beginnig I was having trouble with my ballance and with getting power on my kicks. Our instructors spotted the problem right away and took me aside to correct my michanical flaws. I have to assume that the women were treated the same way.

If everything I've said still doesn't comvince you about hand speed then try this experiment: Buy a tape of a real men's lightweight boxing match and then buy a tape of a real (no Hollywood movies) women's boxing match. Then watch the two tapes back to back and then decide for yourself which gender seems to have the quicker hand speed. End of discussion........

You're a tuff cookie Mulan. I like that! Keep on pushin'!

Take care,

Mr Niceguy

[mrniceguy148]

Anybody would feel overwhelmed and intimidated if the teachers were chauvanist pigs, and the special treatment they gave the guys made them cocky and confrontational. Trust me, I've been in NYC public school co-ed gyms. The teachers are sexist as hell, and so are the guys, as you so adequately prove. I would love to bore you with psychological research about self-fulfilling prophecies and how women score drastically different on math, spatial, physical, verbal and other skills based on how much practice they've had, the sex of the experimentor, there being males in the room, and the wording of the instructions, but this is a martial arts board...

Personally, I feel that girls and boys should be taught in separate classrooms away from eachother for some of the very reasons you mentioned. Right now our educational system favors girls and we've short changed the boys in the pursuit of equality. While girls respond best to positive feedback and praise, this has never worked for boys. The fact is, most boys will only respond to harsh discipline and they're not getting nearly enough discipline in today's public schools. Co-ed education hurts both genders. Too bad we'll never live to see the day when this change will actually happen........It's amazing where an MA discussion can finally end up........

[mrniceguy148]

Really? I seem to remember a famous kickboxing champion saying that Aikido is great for self-defense. I think I trust his word over yours. Leverage, positioning, etc... does work! It's basic physics and there's nothing fancy about it. Whether or not it's taught properly and whether or not it has a fast learning curve is a whole other matter..

If you're happy going on the twenty year plan then what can I say?

You really need to work on your reading comprehension skills. Did I ever deny the importance of force or even brute strength? I did say that there are techniques that defeat force and brute strength, but that's besides the point. The idea of the above post was that there is a point where force and strength pleateu, and training it further would only handicap you because it would take away from training in other aspects of your fighting skill. I don't care if you're a world-champion bodybuilder, if you don't know how to fight, you're screwed. Women can and do learn to hit "hard enough." Whether or not they know how to make a proper fist the first day of Karate class is irrelevant. That's what they're there to learn...

I understood what you said the first time. I just don't agree! I don't think that force and strength ever pleateu. Like anything else, you either use it or lose it. That's why my response came out like it did. That, and also my post was one of my rush jobs............

However, if there is any such thing as a pleateu then the majority of girls in our kempo school probably had already reached it.

Although I have to admit what you've said here, and the way that you said it, does make sense.........

[Mulan]

That's because I know how to dodge a tennis ball, and it's something many women have trouble learning. Missing a tennis ball has everything to do with hand speed because if a skilled women still has trouble reacting to a tennis ball coming at her from thirty feet away then how well do you think she'll react to a hailstorm of punches coming at her from point blank range?

You might not have been hit in the chest or groin, but I'm sure plenty other men have. I'm beginning to wonder how skilled the women in your tennis school are... or if they do speed training. But also the matter of being up against a guy comes into play. Not the fact that a guy is necessarily better, but just that it brings up psychological factors like anxiety and self-defeat. There is a lot of delay and anticipation involved in awaiting a tennis ball coming from 30 feet away, whereas in a fight you can reflexively react to a punch or kick right as you see it. Also, in a fight, your movement wouldn't be hindered by a big clumsy racket, and in hand-to-hand you hit with actual parts of your body (that you hopefully have a good sense of), not an artificial extension of it. That said, I never seen trained women be slower than a man when wielding a weapon - at least in Wushu. And most importantly, tennis does not emply the size/strength/weight-defeating physics techniques that abound in the martial arts.

Personally, I feel that girls and boys should be taught in separate classrooms away from eachother for some of the very reasons you mentioned. Right now our educational system favors girls and we've short changed the boys in the pursuit of equality. While girls respond best to positive feedback and praise, this has never worked for boys. The fact is, most boys will only respond to harsh discipline and they're not getting nearly enough discipline in today's public schools. Co-ed education hurts both genders.

It's not co-education that's the problem, it's societal attitudes and the instructors. It's not anything innate to males and females that makes them respond better to either praise or criticism, it's the nature of how they're raised and how they subsequently interact with those of the same sex. A lot of parents, as good-willing as they are, often highly contrast males and females during upbringing. If a boy cries, he's told men don't cry. If a girl fights, she's told girls don't fight. Yet boys do cry, and girls do fight. However, if a guy wins over a girl, it's cause he's a guy; if a girl wins over a guy, it's cause she was lucky. Those are the more benign examples.

But what this becomes, especially in all-male military or sports training, is that the instructors take it to even wilder extremes... "if you can't do X, then you're a woman!" "do you belong in a women's school? should we get you a skirt?"... Women are correlated with negativism: everytime the guys do something wrong, they are likened to women. It ranges from subtle to very overt brainwashing. As one guy graduated from the Citadel, he was ashamed to realize that he felt "superior to half of the human race."

So, lack of co-education hurts both sexes... but as of right now co-education is only slightly better in the more sexually antagonistic regions and subjects of the USA. The martial arts are said to be "the last bastion" of masculinity in the world, the only place where women have not yet achieved equality... and many men want to keep it that way. However, in less sexually antagonistic countries, such as those of Northern Europe, co-education does a lot more good than harm. The same goes for less sexually antagonistic regions of the USA, like the Midwest where women are encouraged to get involved in sports.

You're a tuff cookie Mulan. I like that! Keep on pushin'!

Thank you

[gregimotis]

even a trained women has slower hands then the average guy! Also, the women in my Kempo school didn't only have slow hands, they also had zero weight behind their punches.

WTF?!?
That's all I have to say about that.


Mulan:
I hope you aren't reading niceguy's post and thinking he's speaking for the other men around these parts. I'm not gonna respond to this thread anymore simply because I don't want to be associated with the ridiculousness of some of the statements made by "Mrwomenaretoweaktodoanythinganyway,theyshouldjustmovebacktothekitchen148"

[Mulan]

WTF?!?
That's all I have to say about that.

My thoughts exactly...

I hope you aren't reading niceguy's post and thinking he's speaking for the other men around these parts.

Hmm, well there are times when I think half the board has testosterone brain poisoning, but I know (hope?) that's just the very loud minority. As for mrniceguy148... all anyone can ever do is share their personal opinions and experiences, and that's what he's doing. I don't think he's consciously trying to put women down, but if he's not being biased (in presenting selective memories) or ignorant (about how differently some instructors treat males and females), the only explanation is that he's been around females that are way below even the average woman's true potential. Everybody else that I trust and respect have had drastically different (ie: more positive) experiences with females in both sports and martial arts. Thank you for your refreshing contribution about women in Muay Thai!

[Mulan]

the Kempo school that I went to is a large school in northern NJ.

Ya know... you mentioning NJ and all has really brought back my NYC memories. It truly is one of the most sexually antagonistic places in the country, second only to the Bible Belt. I went to a Junior High in Brooklyn, and I can personally attest that a great many guys there were sexist bastards. The Spice Girls were becoming popular at the time, and you could sometimes hear the guys mocking the fangirls: "Girl Power?? Girls have no power!" The girls were no better, of course. One of the most pathetic sights I've ever seen were two girls draped and fawning over one guy who was smugly explaining to them how "girls have no biceps."

And of course the co-ed gym, yah I'm getting to that. The teacher pushed the guys much harder than the girls, and criticized them for being "women" if they screwed up even when the girls were present. To pass gym, the guys had to do a pull-up(s), but the girls... the girls got to be picked up by the (male) gym teacher, lifted up to the bar, and told to hand on with their chin over the bar for as long as they could. I was seething mad! When it was my turn and the teacher so much as tried to lay a hand on me, I gave him a nasty "f*ck off" glare, jumped up to the bar myself and hung on. Then again, I think he was impressed by me throughout my entire gym class performance, so when he saw the glare he backed off on his own.

Only me and the other Russian girl (who was strong from taking gymnastics or something) hung on for 30 seconds or more, the rest of the girls dropped pretty quick. It was a pitiful, pitiful sight! What was the difference? Well, I actually trained for it, and the other girl had practice in gymnastics. The rest of the girls? I have no idea, perhaps they didn't give a damn cause they knew they'd pass either way. Remembering this episode I have to admit I am no longer suprised that that many of your NJ female tennis players suck (the reson for why they suck is still sexual antagonism and biased teachers). But believe you me, I live in the Midwest now, and here it's like a whole new breed'o'woman!

[mrniceguy148]

Wtf

WTF?!?
That's all I have to say about that.

Mulan:
I hope you aren't reading niceguy's post and thinking he's speaking for the other men around these parts. I'm not gonna respond to this thread anymore simply because I don't want to be associated with the ridiculousness of some of the statements made by "Mrwomenaretoweaktodoanythinganyway,theyshouldjustmovebacktothekitchen148"

Hi gregimotis,

I understand that you train with some very skilled female kickboxers, and if these women have been kicking your ass from one end of the ring to the other on a regular basis than I can understand why you’d make this statement. But speak for yourself, please, and your own personal experiences and observations. My experiences have been different than yours and by saying these things I’m not trying to put down women or discourage Mulan or anything of the sort. I’m just reporting what I’ve seen! If the truth (as I see it) seems like a gender put-down to you then I’m sorry that I misled you. I’m just trying to be as honest as I can, and present my views concerning the situation as clearly as possible.

I'm Sorry, I just don’t live in an aria that’s heavily populated by Amazon Warrior Women. Maybe you do, I don’t know? However, I refuse to be politically correct and say that there are no gender differences and everybody; man or women, young or old, tall or short, has exactly the same potential! That’s bullshit and you know it; at least you should know it if your any kind of a serious athlete! You obviously haven't been reading my posts with an objective eye! How many times do I have to say, that, “yes most women should be able to defend themselves“. ‘Stun and run” can work wonders for just about anybody! But your living in a fantasy world and you’re lying to women by telling them that all they have to do is join a karate school and through some magic transformation they’ll suddenly be able to walk down the street and beat the crap out of every street thug that crosses her path. Get real, bro! If the average women really wants to learn how to kick some serious ass then she’d better be willing to master at least one MA system, train full contact, and combine that with some serious time in the gym doing hard-core strength training! Then maybe we can talk about it! However, few people, and even fewer women, have either the time, money, or inclination to do all those things.

Your main concern might be to pump up women by using your super-talented hot-shot female kickboxer friends as an example, but my concern is for my partite wife and my two scrawny sisters who’d be physically and psychologically overmatched if they were (God forbid!) ever attacked.

Please keep this in mind the next time you decide to take my words out of context!

Take care,
Mr. Niceguy

[mrniceguy148]

Ya know... you mentioning NJ and all has really brought back my NYC memories. It truly is one of the most sexually antagonistic places in the country, second only to the Bible Belt. I went to a Junior High in Brooklyn, and I can personally attest that a great many guys there were sexist bastards. The Spice Girls were becoming popular at the time, and you could sometimes hear the guys mocking the fangirls: "Girl Power?? Girls have no power!" The girls were no better, of course. One of the most pathetic sights I've ever seen were two girls draped and fawning over one guy who was smugly explaining to them how "girls have no biceps."

And of course the co-ed gym, yah I'm getting to that. The teacher pushed the guys much harder than the girls, and criticized them for being "women" if they screwed up even when the girls were present. To pass gym, the guys had to do a pull-up(s), but the girls... the girls got to be picked up by the (male) gym teacher, lifted up to the bar, and told to hand on with their chin over the bar for as long as they could. I was seething mad! When it was my turn and the teacher so much as tried to lay a hand on me, I gave him a nasty "f*ck off" glare, jumped up to the bar myself and hung on. Then again, I think he was impressed by me throughout my entire gym class performance, so when he saw the glare he backed off on his own.

Only me and the other Russian girl (who was strong from taking gymnastics or something) hung on for 30 seconds or more, the rest of the girls dropped pretty quick. It was a pitiful, pitiful sight! What was the difference? Well, I actually trained for it, and the other girl had practice in gymnastics. The rest of the girls? I have no idea, perhaps they didn't give a damn cause they knew they'd pass either way. Remembering this episode I have to admit I am no longer suprised that that many of your NJ female tennis players suck (the reson for why they suck is still sexual antagonism and biased teachers). But believe you me, I live in the Midwest now, and here it's like a whole new breed'o'woman!

Hi Mulan,

You say so many interesting things that it’s hard for me to keep up! LOL !! I really enjoy everything you have to say, and whether I agree with you or not really doesn’t matter. It’s the exchange of idea that I find quite interesting.

I’ve lived in NJ all my life, and I haven’t had the chance to travel much so I really haven’t seen what goes on in the rest of the country. Although, where I work I see allot of truck drivers who come in from western Pennsylvania.. Out of that small sampling, I’d say that at least some blue collar workers from PA are more sexist than most guys from NJ. Also, I’m not surprised that you ran into allot of sexism in the Brooklyn school system. I hear it’s a ruff aria. The guys that I know from Statin Island are the same way. However, you’ll find much less of that in the NJ suburbs. Personally, I’d like to get out of NJ myself someday because the cost of living, and housing, have become ridiculous.

Actually, I’ve known some pretty good female tennis players here. At the clubs that I played at I knew quite a few women who could beat allot of the guys. These girls were trained and they were just good players and good athletes. Most good women tennis player don’t play the net very well however, but from the baseline they hit hard and they know what they are doing. Although the better women can’t compete with the top male players because the guys are usually taller, with more upper body mass, and as a result they serve much better. That’s where gender differences and athleticism become a factor. Although, in my aria I didn’t know of any super-star women players like a Serina Williams who breaks all barriers. But even at her high level, Serina Williams couldn’t compete with any of the top 500 male pros and she’d probably get beaten by many of the top male college players as well. She’d tell you as much if you ever had the chance to ask her. I have to believe that the demographics are about the same with MA as they are with tennis.

Anyway, yesterday I was in Targets and I was thinking about these discussions. While there I noticed these two tall and muscular women about 25 to 30 years of age, and I was just thinking to myself that both of those women could probably kick my ass. They’d be capable of doing some serious damage to someone with the proper training. So there are some pretty strong women out there as well.

I’d like to tell you that I don’t judge people based on gender, although it may seem that way based on some of my posts. I only look for what a person brings to the table on a physical and psychological level.

However, we do allot of heavy lifting where I work and I’ve seen for myself, by how easily these guys lift heavy objects, that some of those truck drivers that I know could literally break me in two if I ever got into a fight with them. They’d probably do the same thing to an average sized women of around 5’4” to 5’8” also, no matter how hard she trained. If any of these guys ever attacked me I’d had better be able to end it quickly with a throat strike or else by either blowing his knee out with a stomp kick or knocking the wind out of him with a shot to the stomach. Otherwise, my training wouldn’t work against these guys and I’d have absolutely no chance! I’d simply get overpowered and then crushed. That, unfortunately, is what many women are going up against when they get attacked.

I also know another guy who’s about six inches shorter than me but he’s a lightening quick crazy animal. The guy would kill me in a confrontation; no doubt about it.. I’m 6’0” and 160lbs. and if I can admit to you that there are allot of guys running around out there who could literally kill me with their bare hands, then how can I honestly tell an average women who might read this that MA training is a magic formula that will somehow make her invincible no matter what her physical condition may be. It‘s often times just not true, and I have to call it like I see it. I’m not being sexist when I say this because I know there are also some pretty big women out there who could probably kill me as well just by sitting on me if nothing else. On the other hand Karate Illustrated has mentioned many times that it’s not unusual to hear stories about black-belts, both male and female, getting beaten up and raped.

The human body is a fragile thing, and the smaller you are the more vulnerable you are. As adults, if we decide to fight then the outcome could easily become fatal. We have to keep that in mind. We’re not talking about school yard roughhousing anymore. MA and SD training can certainly help, especially women, but we cannot lose sight of the big picture.

I don’t know what type of person you really are and I have no idea what your physical capabilities actually are. That’s something that you’ll have to decide for yourself. I can only suggest, when making your own self evaluation, that you look at the people around you with and objective eye and then be brutally honest with yourself. A mistake in that thought process could end up costing you your life.

BTW, I take this stuff very seriously and I don’t discriminate based on gender. However, the anonymous nature of the internet makes these types of across the board generalizations easy to make. A face to face discussion would change allot of that because then we’d be talking with real people instead of faceless screen names.

Anyway, I hope that this gives you a more balanced idea of who I am and why I have the beliefs that I do. Like I said earlier in another thread, I’m a 98 pound weakling myself, so I can look at this thing from somewhat of the same perspective as the average female might see it.

Hope that this helps you understand me better!

Take care,
Mr. Niceguy

[Mulan]

I also know another guy who’s about six inches shorter than me but he’s a lightening quick crazy animal. The guy would kill me in a confrontation; no doubt about it.. I’m 6’0” and 160lbs. and if I can admit to you that there are allot of guys running around out there who could literally kill me with their bare hands, then how can I honestly tell an average women who might read this that MA training is a magic formula that will somehow make her invincible no matter what her physical condition may be.

Oh I wasn't suggesting any "magic formulas" for "invincibility" (that's for another thread ), just willpower, training, and the determination to test things that society brainwashes us to take for granted. The fact remains that there were women who dueled the 3,000 best swordsmen of an entire nation and won, there were women who fought alongside men as equals, and there were women who led successful armies into battle. Just like great men in history reflect the potential of all men, so do these great women reflect the potential of all women.

But whether a man or a woman is capable of reaching that potential depends largely on whether or not they are willing to push themselves past the limits placed on them by society more than the limits of their physical bodies. Our athletic ability and stature do play a very large part in what physical feats we can accomplish, but if we let society beat us down before we see for ourselves what our capabilities actually are, then you would never see these extraordinary individuals.

It seems that it is taken for granted that height, weight, and strength are huge factors in a fight, and I know there is a very good reason why that is so - the primary being taking and giving powerful hits. But it still seems too crude for them to be the sole deciding factor in a fight, otherwise, why bother learning a martial art at all? A trained person should have certain advantages over an untrained person. Of course, tall, heavy, strong people can also be trained.

But could it be that people have focussed on the easy advantages of height, weight, and strength for so long, that they have overlooked or seldom deveoped serious strategies focussed on speed (not just as related to striking, but also as related to dodging), evasion, flexibility, lightness, stealth, and smallness? Not getting hit - what a concept! Hard to pull off, yah, but still possible. I guess we won't know until some real Tai Chi Chuan or Bagua artists enter a MMA tournament. It's hard to hold off an opponent for long (but can give you chance to run away), and the majority of fights do end up clinched or on the ground, but that's what BJJ (a relatively weight-neutral MA) is for.

It is good that you don't judge people based on gender, and that is all I was suggesting in the original post. Do not say that "a woman wouldn't be able to go up against a 6'2" 200lb man," because a 5'7" 140lb male would have the exact same chance against such a man (read: there is a chance). Instead of seeing the outcome of a fight or competition based on sex, it is wiser to see it as a sum of relevant statistics, such as an individual's height, strength, agility, dexterity, speed, power, endurance, skill, toughness, strategy, intelligence, and so on. As you (and many others) note, there are people out there capable of generating much more force, speed, and ferocity than a superficial evaluation of them would suggest, and they might use tactics you are entirely unprepared for.